All posts filed under: Literature & Social Justice

Co-written by Sarah Heidebrink-Bruno and Jimmy Hamill Sarah Heidebrink-Bruno, Ph.D. Candidate, 2 years in the Center for Gender Equity For me, one of the best parts of teaching before and after I had a GA position at the Center for Gender Equity was the fact that my experiences in the classroom and in a student center symbiotically benefited one another. For instance, being a teacher taught me how to manage my time, respond thoughtfully to […]

Every time I sit down to write this blog post another sexual assault story breaks. What follows are drafts I’ve started and stopped in an effort to document the scandals (plural) as new facts come to light.

This post is the second in an eight-part series on imagining alternatives to Capitalism. The first installment is available here. We invite you to join “Tackling T.I.N.A – An Anticapitalist Reading Group” for bi-weekly readings and discussions on this and related subjects. We meet every other Thursday at noon. Email Adam Heidebrink-Bruno (adh216@lehigh.edu) or Mareesa Miles (mam916@lehigh.edu) to see the schedule, join the email list and find out more. Capitalism: they say there is no alternative. […]

In the first meeting of Tackling T.I.N.A, an anti-capitalist reading group, we immersed ourselves in discussion surrounding the power of imagination in struggles for change. As literary scholars our work centers around the imagination. One of the core tenets of fiction is that even when it is based on reality, it comes directly from the imagination. We value fiction for the truths that it can tell us about the world. This positions us as change […]

The editors of Drown Unbound welcome back all returning members of our community and bid a special welcome to the department’s new graduate students. While we hope that everyone enjoys a productive and positive 2017-18 academic year, we would feel remiss were we not to acknowledge the utterly grave historical moment in which we find ourselves at the start of this term.

Synergy was achieved a few weeks ago when Lehigh played host to the most radical tea party since Sam Adams and friends got busy in Boston Harbor. Four women who have played leading roles in some of the most profound movements for social justice in the last half-century came together for tea and solidarity in the Zoellner Arts Center. Ericka Huggins, Joan Trumpauer Mulholland, Denise Oliver-Velez, and Sonia Sanchez shared from their wealth of life-stories […]

While drafting my English 2 proposal and planning my course last October, I had no idea how painfully relevant the overall theme would be, come spring semester. My English 2 focuses on the rhetoric of resistance: “Our section of English 2 will focus on the implications of language and writing in the context of various forms of resistance: self-definition and identity formation, visual rhetoric, and body rhetoric. Students will learn how these forms of resistance […]

On February 17th & 18th, scholars from the Lehigh community were treated to an opportunity to participate in a workshop on the theories, methods, and practice of oral history led by acclaimed oral historian Mary Marshall Clark. Clark is the director of the Columbia Center for Oral History Research and Columbia University’s Oral History MA degree program. Her work in the field has been extensive and diverse. Some of the major projects she has conducted […]

This year, thanks to generous support from the English Department, the Literature and Social Justice Graduate Conference will host its first external keynote speaker: Dr. Kavita Daiya. Dr. Kavita Daiya is Associate Professor of English and Affiliated Faculty in the Women’s Studies Program and Global Women’s Institute at George Washington University. In AY 2015-2016, she held the NEH endowed Chair in the Humanities at Albright College, focusing on Global Migration and Asia. She was Mellon […]

Last Tuesday (January 31st) I had the privilege of attending a rally with my friends, colleagues, and students at Lehigh University. The purpose of the rally was to protest President Trump’s recent executive order banning immigration from specific nations and from my perspective, more importantly, to stand in solidarity with all immigrants in our community. I had never attended a political rally before; my anxiety disorder makes it difficult for me to be in large […]